Chapter 61

Chapter 61
“They dissolved into blue fragments and completely vanished?”

Only at that moment did I grasp why Shut-in Honey was trapped in such profound shock and terror.

Dissolving into blue fragments and disappearing the exact second nourishment touched your lips was a characteristic exclusive to players. At least, that was how the mechanic had always functioned.

Other non-player characters, unlike us players, consumed provisions the standard way—biting, chewing, and swallowing. Therefore, watching a creature that wasn’t a player devour a human and exhibit that exact identical phenomenon would naturally leave anyone baffled.

“Why do you suppose they did that?” Shut-in Honey inquired, visibly agitated.

“Could they be players as well?”

“How would I have the answer if you put it to me?”

“You are far more clever than I am!”

So this individual becomes remarkably cooperative the moment he finds himself backed into a corner. Not that I possessed any genuine theories myself. By the time I had reached the scene, I hadn’t even witnessed the creatures consuming anyone.

Simply figuring out why they had bolted at the mere sight of me was enough to give me a migraine. And now their method of eating mirrored our own?

“For the time being… I believe I would need to observe it with my own eyes before drawing any conclusions.”

My lukewarm reply caused Shut-in Honey to spring up from his seat.

“I witnessed it plainly, I assure you!”

“I am not questioning your account. It is simply that certain truths are only truly understood when you experience them firsthand.”

Shut-in Honey had questioned whether those creatures might also be players—yet just because an object touching their mouths turned into blue particles and vanished did not automatically mean every single one of them was a player.

Even the horned rabbits I had encountered during an earlier hunt had crunched the cookies I left out for bait, meaning that specific trait might belong exclusively to the particular ones he had just observed.

“In any case, those alien creatures already possess the power to regenerate injuries using moonlight. Even if they can heal themselves by ingesting something, it is hardly shocking that—”

I cut myself off midway through my sentence. Shut-in Honey gazed at me with the look of someone who understood precisely why I had paused.

“You felt it too while you were speaking, didn’t you? That something feels inherently wrong.”

I glanced down at my own physical form for a brief second.

Immediately following the possession, I simply assumed this was merely an in-game realm, so I never probed deeply into the matter…

As though he were reading my thoughts, Shut-in Honey asked, “These vessels we have inhabited. Where on earth did they originate? Have you ever given it any thought?”

Looking back now, even the term “possession” felt bizarre. If we had genuinely taken over someone else’s body, there should have been at least a single individual who recognized the previous owners of these forms.

Even Anton had failed to track down anyone who knew me—which was precisely why he had been so deeply suspicious of my background. This implied that the “bodies” we were currently wearing had simply materialized out of thin air the day we took over this universe.

“So that is why you wondered if those creatures were players.”

I turned my gaze toward Shut-in Honey. “What are you actually trying to imply?”

His expression grew graver than I had ever witnessed before. “I suspect… that we are monsters.”

I stared at him in silence for a few moments, then exhaled a lengthy breath.

“Hah……”

“Hey! Someone is speaking with complete sincerity and you respond with a sigh? Does your physical form not strike you as strange right now? It is deeply bizarre. This body possesses absurdly high physical capabilities!”

Fair enough—while battling those massive creatures earlier, I had thought the output exceeded what a standard ten-year-old body should ever be able to generate. I had previously assumed physical strength and self-healing were exclusive player privileges, but… another secret might be at play.

Nevertheless.

“We are not monsters. For one thing, we lack gems.”

“Ah……”

The mention of the gems seemed to pull him back to reality somewhat. What separated true monsters from humans wasn’t merely outward appearance or regenerative power—above all else, it was the existence of a core gem.

Monsters originating from meteorites each housed a central gem. Even if a rabbit bearing a horn on its head was running about, if no crystal was embedded within its anatomy, it was nothing more than a mutated rabbit. Our bodies contained no embedded gems, so labeling ourselves as humanoid monsters was quite a stretch.

Shut-in Honey appeared to ponder something for a moment before whispering, “But those things… their intellect was suspiciously high. What if there are players who ended up possessing large-class monsters?”

Thus, he remained convinced, one way or another, that those creatures shared a connection to players. I took this hypothesis seriously, at least.

“What you are suggesting is not entirely absurd. There appear to be individuals, such as the Unicorn Area players, who inhabited adult forms, meaning other anomalies could certainly exist.”

“Right?!”

“Which is precisely why I need to witness them with my own eyes all the more. If those things turn out to be players, I will make them regret messing around in my backyard. If they are not……” Past Shut-in Honey’s shoulder, I noticed the Commander and Meursault exiting the tent one after another, prompting me to wrap the conversation up swiftly. “We will cross that bridge when we arrive. Whether we are human or monster, it alters nothing regarding the fact that we must clear this world.”

Shut-in Honey did not look entirely convinced by the notion that human or monster status changed nothing, yet he still nodded obediently. I observed him for a second before inquiring, “Still… does it not strike you as peculiar that the monsters bolted the moment I arrived?”

If their feeding habits were bizarre, the logical reaction should have been to question why they fled the exact second I appeared. Shut-in Honey replied with an expression indicating he genuinely found nothing strange about it whatsoever.

“What is odd about that? I would run away too if I laid eyes on you.”

Hmm. Between Meursault and this fellow, what exactly did they imagine I was?

—

Once the reorganization concluded, we resumed our search efforts. The original strategy had been to regroup the teams, continue scouting until the wounded personnel returned, and then head back. Yet after listening to Shut-in Honey’s account, I felt compelled to capture at least one of the four fleeing entities to investigate for ourselves.

To verify whether they truly could convert nourishment into blue particles at their mouths and mend wounds with it. Why they traveled in a pack. Why they panicked upon seeing me. Unless I pinned down even a single definitive answer, this lingering sense of unease would not dissipate.

I glanced down at the combat rations secured to my belt. There was no telling whether combat rations even registered as food for a creature. If they did not, I would likely have to risk injury and sacrifice one of my own arms instead.

The real complication lay in figuring out how to transition a standard reconnaissance patrol into a hunt for those four creatures while saddled with a squad that included the Commander. To make matters worse, the snow that had begun flurry-like a short while ago was intensifying by the minute—we wouldn’t be able to maintain our search for much longer.

The signal flare we deployed upon locating monsters was white. Once the snowfall grew any heavier, distinguishing it from the surrounding snow would become impossible.

“Lord Haydam.”

Second Lieutenant Platon, the former leader of Team 9 who had been reassigned to Team 1 alongside me, approached me with sparkling eyes. The motivation behind his approach was glaringly obvious. The other fellows who had joined Team 1 had been taking turns raving about my earlier display one after another.

How had I driven off four massive creatures using nothing more than a glance? I didn’t even have an explanation for that myself, and I was already growing weary of fabricating excuses.

“You are hoping to discover how I chased them away as well?”

When I turned my exhausted gaze toward him, he waved both hands defensively as if pleading his innocence.

“Ah—no, Lord Haydam.”

“No?”

“To be completely honest… I fail to understand why everyone is making such a tremendous fuss.”

Now that perspective was a refreshing change. I looked at him with renewed interest as Platon pressed on.

“Driving off three or four large-class monsters is nothing extraordinary for you, Lord Haydam. Even the creatures themselves recognized they stood no chance and fled—yet the soldiers of this very zone remain oblivious, which is a tragedy above all else.”

Mmm. You happen to be the one making the most substantial fuss of all right now, however?

“Regardless, the matter I actually wished to bring up is entirely different.”

“What is it?”

“The method for identifying gem locations. Was it you who instructed the military in that technique, Lord Haydam?”

I had ensured the gem location identification protocol was taught to the junior officers ahead of the subjugation campaign, but I had never explicitly informed the military or the new officers that I was its creator. It was the exact reason Meursault, rather than myself, was recognized as the tactical officer for this operation.

This marked the initial year the technique was being put into practice. If word leaked that a freshly transformed ten-year-old had engineered it, would the troops genuinely place their trust in it and follow suit? That had been my line of reasoning. The junior officers had observed and interacted with me directly at the academy, but regular soldiers were a different story entirely. Most of them barely recognized my face.

Even during the recent engagement, they had not obeyed my directives instantly—only shifting into action after monitoring Meursault’s reaction. Consequently, the gem location identification method had been transmitted to the rank-and-file soldiers through headquarters only after the Commander and Meursault had thoroughly validated it. Platon, however, clearly believed I was the mastermind behind this tactic as well.

“What makes you assume I was the one who taught it?”

“We underwent training for the technique ourselves, yet when we actually confronted multiple large-class monsters, virtually none of the soldiers executed it correctly. Yet the moment you arrived at the front lines, Lord Haydam, you discharged merely two rounds and eliminated two of them.”

Mm. Meursault had assisted with the initial target, but that specific detail seemed to have already slipped from everyone’s minds.

“Assuming I was the one who taught it… why does that matter?”

“I mentioned that almost no soldier applied the method properly… but I witnessed a single soldier hunting creatures with maneuvers operating nearly on par with your own, Lord Haydam.”

As he spoke, Platon cast a glance over his shoulder. His line of sight settled on Shut-in Honey, trailing a short distance behind us. Our unit was compact enough that if the two of us remained side by side, that fool would inevitably blurt out something foolish, which was why I had ordered him to keep his distance.

Platon shifted his eyes away from Shut-in Honey and back toward me. “The large-class monster that was neutralized prior to your arrival, Lord Haydam—that companion of yours is the one who dispatched it.”

“Is that so? I was unaware.”

So he had brought down an entire large-class monster and then approached me merely to complain about how bizarre the creatures were. That must explain why it had been so shocking for him to realize they “ate” in the exact same manner we did. The Commander hadn’t incorporated Shut-in Honey into Team 1 simply because he rushed forward to assist me, either.

“The two of you appeared to be acquainted… is that accurate?”

The fact that Shut-in Honey and I were close was already common knowledge to nearly everyone, so I saw no point in denying it.

“Yes. We know each other.”

“Then……” Platon hesitated, uncharacteristically, before lowering his voice to ask, “The child my father abducted… was that person, by any chance?”

I halted my footsteps and stared directly at Platon.

How on earth does this individual possess knowledge of that event?

Do not tell me. Was this fellow digging into his own father’s past on my account now?